The Dutch Healthcare Authority recommends the adoption of new integrated funding for maternity care by 2028

Almost every mother with her unborn child receives support from various professionals and organizations, the midwife, the gynecologist, the obstetric nurse, and the maternity nurse. The aim of integrated birth care is to increase the quality and safety of birth care and to reduce morbidity and mortality. Integrated maternity care focuses on the pregnant woman and her unborn child and stimulates collaboration between care professionals from different providers.

The policy rule for Integrated Birth Care was published by the Dutch National Authority for Health (NZa) on July 1, 2017. It contains nine services divided into three phases of birth care (prenatal, natal, postnatal), including:

• Counseling ending before 16 weeks of pregnancy, including aftercare
• Prenatal birth care
• Complex prenatal birth care
• Natal birth care
• Natal birth care at the client's request
• Complex natal birth care
• Postnatal birth care
• Complex postnatal birth care
• Postnatal maternity care per hour

The aim of the policy rule is to lay down conditions under which it is possible to deviate from regular funding and to offer healthcare providers and healthcare insurers the option of agreeing on an experiment for the funding of integrated maternity care to promote cooperation in maternity care

After the adoption of the Policy Rule in 2017, the experiment on integral funding of maternity continues until January 1, 2022. On September 9, 2020, the NZa published advice on the timing of implementation of integrated funding for maternity care. The new funding model should be adopted by 2028 at the latest.

The full details in Dutch can be found here.

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